


La Belle Dame sans Merci

by forthegreatergood



Category: James Bond (Craig movies), Skyfall (2012) - Fandom, bond - Fandom
Genre: Anal Sex, Cunnilingus, Explicit Sexual Content, F/M, M/M, Oral Sex, Pining, Threesome - F/M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-02-28
Updated: 2016-02-27
Packaged: 2018-05-23 16:22:57
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 5,556
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6122338
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/forthegreatergood/pseuds/forthegreatergood
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Eve is the fulcrum on which their world moves.</p>
<hr/>
<p>“You want him,” Eve says quietly, leaning close enough that her breath makes the nape of Q's neck prickle.</p>
<p>His cheeks are burning, and he swallows the rest of his drink in one gulp.  There’s no sense in denying it.</p>
<p>“Who doesn’t?” he retorts.  More softly, he continues, “Not that it matters.”</p>
<p>“Why not?” Eve asks.</p>
<p>He laughs, and he’s surprised when he sounds bitter instead of just pathetic. “He’d hardly respect me in the morning, would he?”</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> All characters property of their respective owners.
> 
> Not beta-read. Please post any noticed errors in the comments, and they'll get fixed.

Moneypenny checks her watch, an elegant affair made of white gold and rubies whose battery can double as a bug if need be, and Q feels a tiny spark of pride. Either the gift pleased her enough that she wears it on her own time, or she thinks well enough of him to wear it as a subtle compliment. He doesn’t much care which; he’s not sure what he’d prefer if he had to pick. It’s been a long time since he’s thought of ‘himself’ as a thing separate from ‘his work.’ He only knows that the watch looks beautiful on her wrist as she drains her glass.

“Prior engagement?” he asks, trying to muffle his disappointment.

Her nose wrinkles slightly. “Bond.”

“Ah.” 

His tongue rests against the back of his teeth, and he’s not sure if there’s enough bourbon thinning his blood yet to ask. Her eyes narrow at his tone, though, and suddenly he doesn’t have the option of keeping his thoughts to himself.

“What?” she asks.

“You don’t seem terribly thrilled at the prospect,” he explains, his gaze on his tumbler as he rolls it between his palms. He’s suddenly nervous, but the bottom-heavy weight of the glass grounds him, and the condensation from its sides gives him an alibi in case she takes his hand.

“And?” she prompts. It’s not a question. She knows there’s more, can see it in his posture.

“Office gossip.” He shrugs uncomfortably. “I thought you were seeing each other.” He puts the glass down. “Socially.”

“That we’re screwing, you mean,” she says, but there’s no heat in it. He risks a glance at her, and her dark eyes are sparkling. She seems far more amused than put out.

“Yes,” he manages, his throat suddenly dry. The liquor burns more this time, and he chokes back a cough.

“We are.” She smiles slightly. “But this is work, not play. He was supposed to have called by now with a brief.”

“Ah.” It comes out more strongly than he meant it to, but his sympathy is reflexive. None of the 00s are easy on their equipment, but that’s to be expected. Feedback--what worked, what didn’t, what could be better--is more important than bringing anything back in salvageable condition, so far as Q’s concerned. Officially, he has to care. He’s responsible for the section’s budget. Unofficially, he’s more concerned with blood unspilled than pounds unspent. Bond tends to straggle back into the fold with nothing but the clothes on his back, and then ignore Q’s requests for information on failures, handling, or performance. He can’t imagine Bond is more cooperative with anyone else.

Moneypenny laughs outright. 

“The man himself in one syllable,” she says. She signals the bartender for another drink.

Q finishes his bourbon and passes the glass across the bar. Questions cluster in his mouth that he’ll never be drunk enough to ask, but he doesn’t want to risk it. Eve is a good friend. Eve is an excellent agent. When he made her come, his tongue hot against her clit and her fingers twisting in his hair, it was the closest he’s ever been to touching the divine. It only happened the one time, and, by a sort of mutually-sensed preference, they’ve never spoken of it. Q suspects that prying about Bond would stray too close to forbidden territory.

He’d initially chalked up reports that Moneypenny and Bond were an item to the support staff’s predilection for insisting that everyone and Bond were an item. Between the man’s appetite and the man’s prowess, wholly fabricated reports of his exploits stood a reasonable chance of being correct in spite of themselves. But Moneypenny...Q hadn’t been able to imagine her taking Bond up on an offer. She took her position too seriously, and Bond was notoriously difficult even without fraternization complicating things. There were surely men who could fuck just as long and just as well, men just as handsome, who were less troublesome. Why would she take Bond to her bed?

And then it had become impossible to ignore. They’d been discreet, tactically. They didn’t arrive or leave together, when they were in the office at the same time. They didn’t request each other on assignments. They didn’t disappear without explanation and reappear unaccountably rumpled. But it was obvious to anyone who knew Moneypenny, which Q did, and to anyone who’d spent much time at all watching Bond, which Q hadn’t realized he did.

When Moneypenny was in the room, Bond’s eyes inevitably went to her when he answered a question or made a decision. When Moneypenny was in the room, Bond’s stillness went from a willful act of restraint to a more genuine state of ease. When Moneypenny was in the room, Bond was almost well-behaved.

It was amazing, Q thinks, what starting a relationship by shooting someone could achieve.

“Say it,” Moneypenny murmurs, and Q’s jolted out of his reverie to find her gaze heavy on him. His glass has also been refilled, though he didn’t ask for it. He’s not sure if the bartender has taken pity or taken advantage.

He wants to say “There’s nothing to say.”, but he knows that wouldn’t satisfy her.

He wants to say “Well done, love.” in some conjured jocular tone and buy her a congratulatory round, but he’s a terrible actor. And she knows him too well to be deceived even if he could pull it off.

“Is he worth it?” he finally asks. He doesn’t know Bond, not really. His position means that he can’t afford to be intimidated by the Crown’s barely-tame predators, and he’s never let himself be. But he’s also never spent more time with the man than necessary, because he knows better than to think there’s such a thing as sure footing around someone like Bond. He understands instinctively that whatever authority Bond recognizes in Moneypenny has been hard-won.

“Most of the time,” she says drily, and checks her watch again. “Or were you asking if the sex is worth it?”

Q’s glad of his refill, then. He silently promises the bartender a hefty tip as he raises his glass, trying to cover the rising flush he can feel on his cheeks. It wasn’t what he’d been asking. He knows what she sounds like when she comes, knows what her cunt tastes like when her juices are flowing. It was safe with her. They’d built an easy rapport, before that. They’d liked and respected each other, before that. There hadn’t been a feeling of winning or losing when he’d run his hands over the dark velvet of her skin, gotten on his knees for her, come for her.

He’s never let himself imagine what Bond might really be like in bed. For all the confidence Q manages to project while he’s working, he won’t undermine himself by indulging in schoolboy fantasies. He knows what he looks like. He’s carved out a space for himself by brains and bravado; brawn has never been an option for him. If he ever feels like playing injured gazelle to some muscle-bound tough’s prowling lion, there are clubs full of willing men he’d never have to see again.

“If the typing pool is to be believed, I’m sure that part’s perfectly acceptable,” Q says. He’s trying for sardonic or witty, a mask of coolness that might convince her to drop it or at least throw her off the scent. He should know better.

“Perfectly acceptable,” Moneypenny repeats, a smile beginning at the corner of her mouth. 

She picks the cherry out of her cocktail and teases the fruit off its stem with violet-tinted lips, watching him. He really looks at her then, takes in the way her eyes are almost amber in the fading light, the sinuous strength of her body, the way her dress clings to her curves. She’s so beautiful that it registers as a kind of pain, and he has to look away again. He hasn’t missed her calculating expression, and he’s not certain whether the affection tempering it frightens him or reassures him. That she won’t hurt him soothes him. That he’d do anything for her scares the hell out of him.

“You want him,” she says quietly, leaning close enough that her breath makes the nape of his neck prickle.

His cheeks are burning, and he swallows the rest of his drink in one gulp. There’s no sense in denying it.

“Who doesn’t?” he retorts. More softly, he continues, “Not that it matters.”

“Why not?” Eve asks.

He laughs, and he’s surprised when he sounds bitter instead of just pathetic. “He’d hardly respect me in the morning, would he?”

***

Eve knows she should put Q in a cab, ruffle his hair, and wish him good night. He’s had too much to drink, and she’s flustered him badly with her questions about James. She takes him home with her instead, because she can’t bear to let him out of her sight just yet.

She wants to wring him out, make him come until he’s putty in her hands. He let her, once, and she can still feel the silk of his hair sliding through her fingers. 

She makes him drink two glasses of water, tucks him in on the sofa, and resists the urge to do anything else. He loves her, and she knows it, but that’s never translated into any sort of permission with Q. That’s the sort of thing that needs to be extracted carefully, patiently, when he’s sure of himself. He’s not like James, with his bone-deep, reckless need to have someone--anyone--else’s hands on his reins, consequences be damned.

Eve fixes herself a manhattan and watches him sleep. She’s sure James will get around to texting soon, probably five minutes after she decides she’d rather be in bed herself, and then she’ll have a report to forward to one CO or another, depending on what he’s found out. It’s something James could just as easily do himself, but protocol requires at least one other agent in the loop. In the meantime, Q looks like an angel, and his interest in James has given her imagination something to do.

She knows James is more than interested; she’d have to be blind to miss the way his eyes slide over Q any time he thinks he can get away with it. She hadn’t guessed that Q’s icy indifference to James’s behavior masked desire as well as irritation. Q has very little patience for agency pissing matches, and James is fond of using sex as a weapon, so she can forgive herself the oversight. She thinks of how James’s callused hands would fit around Q’s narrow hips, how hungrily James’s mouth would press against that pale throat. 

James, she has found, fucks like a man worried that his partner will come to their senses. Even with her, even as long as they’ve been doing this, he’s always simultaneously trying to prove himself and drain the experience to its dregs. She can only assume the guarantee of a one-time arrangement will exacerbate the tendency, and she smiles at the thought of Q’s self-possession swept away under that onslaught. Eve wonders how Q would sound when James made him come for the third time. Even after the first time, with her, his voice was beautifully broken. Her cunt aches when she looks at him and pictures James on top of him, taking him, and she can’t pretend she doesn’t want to set the wheels in motion. 

James will never be all hers. It’s not in his nature, even if the job would allow it. Q isn’t hers either, not precisely. She doesn’t claim more of him than she can keep. But they both belong to her enough that she can give them to each other, set that much of an indelible mark on them both.

Q stirs then, as if he senses what she’s thinking, and whimpers in his sleep. Eve crouches down and strokes his hair gently until he subsides. He seems younger than his years, and she wonders if part of James’s fascination lies in how delicate Q seems. It’s not something that appeals to her; Eve doesn’t like things she has to be too careful of. Fortunately for both of them, it’s mostly an illusion. Q is sturdier than his fine-china looks let on, and he’s quick on his feet and good with a knife. Not good enough for field-work, but at least Eve doesn’t have to worry too much about him getting himself out of any trouble that comes home to roost.

He plays the shrinking violet well, though, and she’s seen him use it to good effect on more than one occasion. And James...there’s definitely a part of James that enjoys the idea of leaving fingerprints all over something he’s not supposed to touch.

Eve pulls the blanket back up to cover Q’s shoulders, collects her drink, and decamps to her bedroom. They can talk about it in the morning.

***

When Eve wakes, it’s to the smell of of breakfast cooking. She primps just enough to put a thumb on the scale when she brings up the subject of James and then joins Q in the kitchen. There wasn’t much in the fridge when she turned in last night, but Q’s inventiveness is hardly confined to the workshop and the bedroom.

He hasn’t bothered laying the table; mornings like this inevitably see them eating off the sideboard, if not claiming their meals straight from the pan. Eve plucks a piece of thick-cut toast off a plate stacked with them, and Q tuts at her. Eve bites into it anyway, and the burst of tomato and basil under the garlic and butter tells her that he’s raided the herb-box on the windowsill. It tastes good enough that she doesn’t mind. Q hands her a fresh plate with another piece of toast on it and adds a poached egg, his brows knitting.

“A bit firmer than you like,” he warns, “but I didn’t want them to get cold with the wait.”

Eve breaks the yolk and starts mopping it up with the bread, pleased with the smile he gives her. It’s not, she thinks, that he enjoys cooking for its own sake so much as he enjoys feeding her. She’s found that he can be a bit of a mother hen about field agents if given half the chance.

“It’s delicious,” she says, and it’s not flattery.

Q smiles more broadly this time, not quite preening. “Did Bond ever check in last night?”

“Eventually.” She leaves it at that, and Q lets it drop, seeming satisfied that the one bit of outstanding business has been cleared up. He gets out a plate for himself as well, his own food receiving a light dusting of pepper before he digs in.

Eve watches him for a long moment before he notices it and reflexively colors.

“What is it?” he asks, already running his tongue over his teeth and one hand through his hair.

“The first question out of your mouth this morning, and it’s about Bond,” she observes gently. His blush darkens beautifully, and he turns back to the stove.

“You just seemed annoyed about it, that’s all,” he says. He’s defensive but not prickly, and Eve takes that as a good sign.

“He annoys you, too,” she reminds him.

“That’s different.” His lips purse. “I’m not sleeping with him.”

“You could, if you wanted.” She’s careful about how she says it, her tone neutral but serious, no hint of a joke to it.

Q shakes his head sharply. “I can’t, Eve. You know it. I’ve barely any high ground with him as it is.”

She reaches out, and he goes still as a statue. She tucks a strand of hair behind his ear and lets her fingertips graze the curve of his cheekbone, and he turns his face into her hand.

“I’ve got enough for both of us, though,” she murmurs. “And I don’t mind sharing, so long as it’s with a friend.”

The look he gives her sends a thrill coursing down her spine. Those sea-gray eyes of his are all want and need and wariness, and she knows he’ll say yes so long as she can tell him why he should.

Eve hooks a finger in the front of his shirt and draws him close, and his breath hitches. She kisses him gently, slowly, and he can’t stifle a disappointed groan when she pulls away.

“Think of it as a gift,” Eve tells him. “One I’d very much like to give you.”

He understands, suddenly, what she’s offering, and the wariness vanishes. If he wants James, it’s a weakness, and they both know how ruthless James can be when it suits him. But if it’s something she’s arranged to please herself, it’s just James reaping an unexpected benefit of his association with her, something he can’t exploit without her as an intermediary. Q wouldn’t be friends with her if he didn’t trust her; his tolerance for the petty gamesmanship that goes on inside the agency is too low. He’s the sort of man who needs a clear line between friend and foe if he’s to do what he does with a clean conscience, and it frustrates him when agents and officers muddy the waters. If she says she’s giving him an excuse, he won’t question it.

Eve smiles and lets go of Q’s shirt, then picks up her breakfast. “Well?”

“I’d very much like to accept,” he says.

“Good.” Eve feels a spark of triumph at the way he can’t quite cover his anticipation. The only question left is how quickly she can make it happen.


	2. Chapter 2

James nurses his drink and watches the entrance to Eve’s building. The key to her apartment is heavy in his pocket, but she hasn’t texted yet. He’s honestly not sure what he’s done to deserve this. He knows he and Eve are little more than colleagues. He knows he has no right to expect any sort of consideration, however hard he’s made her come, however much she’s tolerated his intrusions into her personal life. But there’s knowing it, and then there’s having his face rubbed in it. He doesn’t particularly want to watch her with another man, if he can avoid it.

This is what she’s asked for, though. He finishes his whiskey and straightens his collar. Tonight isn’t the night he’ll start disappointing her.

His phone buzzes in his pocket, and he doesn’t need to check it to know that it’s her. He reads it anyway, then grimly makes his way to her flat. The elevator gives him fifteen floors to get his face on, to conjure up enough false enthusiasm that he won’t spoil the evening for her. He’s never been one for half-measures; refusal or enthusiastic participation are the only valid options, so far as he’s concerned. Beyond that, he knows what Eve appreciates about him most is his ability to endure. He’s taken a bullet for her, after all.

Eve opens the door as he raises his hand to knock, and it’s all he can do not to stare. She’s always gorgeous, and she’s outdone herself proving it this time. James is sure he’s seen women more beautiful, but he’s hard-pressed to come up with when and where.

“007, reporting for duty,” he says. It brings a small smile to her lips.

She curls her fingers in the front of his shirt and pulls him close enough to kiss.

“His mouth,” she says quietly, “is mine. Understand?”

James doesn’t, but he nods, trusting that he will once it becomes important. He follows her into the living room, and Q turns, holding out a drink. Q blinks when he sees him, blue eyes going wide behind his glasses, then blushes slightly and looks away, toward Eve. She takes the cocktail from his hand and perches on a barstool, her ankles crossed daintily and her expression smug.

“Ah. I hadn’t realized,” Q mutters, regaining his composure. He gestures vaguely toward the liquor cabinet. “Um. Would you like something?”

“Martini,” James says. 

The pieces have fallen into place, but he still can’t quite believe it. Q mixes the drink, self-consciousness written in every line of his body, and James can’t remember ever having seen Q out of his element before. He has to admit, it’s rather becoming. Eve meets his eyes, then inclines her head firmly toward Q, her eyebrows climbing impatiently. James believes it then. He’s not sure how she’s gotten Q to agree, though he can guess. The boy clearly worships the ground she walks on. He’s not sure why she’s letting him have this. Just as he couldn’t recall any especially grievous sin when he thought he was being punished, he can’t recall anything particularly deserving of a reward now.

For better or worse, James hasn’t gotten where he is in life by being too wary of good fortune.

Q’s barely put the shaker down when James crowds him against the counter, knots his fingers in dark hair, and sucks a bruise into his throat. James wants to kiss him, but Eve’s one rule suddenly makes sense. The small, surprised noise Q makes is some compensation for it. Q’s hands come to rest on his chest, neither pushing him away nor clinging to him, and James decides he can settle for acceptance for now. It’s a far cry from Q’s usual aloofness, at least.

He unbuttons Q’s shirt quickly, not loosening his grip on Q’s hair or taking his mouth from Q’s throat, and runs his free hand over Q’s waist. Q gasps softly at the touch, and James lets his hand drift lower. He’s a little surprised to find Q half-hard, but it’s a relief. Talking someone into something they already want but know is a terrible idea is more satisfying than pursuing an indifferent prospect, in his experience. God knows he’s had enough of both in the line of duty. He wants Q to want this, not simply put up with it for a chance with Eve. He wants Q to melt for him. He wants something to remember when Q is back to ignoring him during instruction sessions.

James can feel Eve’s eyes on him when he opens Q’s trousers and drops to one knee, and Q chokes back a moan when James takes his cock and guides his length into his mouth. Q’s entire body is practically vibrating with tension, like he wants to bolt, and James puts his hand on Q’s hips and presses him firmly back against the wall to ground him. James sucks him gently, and Q is completely hard in the space of a few heartbeats. He’s also looking anywhere but at James. 

He watches Q blush scarlet when he looks across the room to Eve, and only then does Q glance down at him. James takes the opportunity to flick his tongue against the head of Q’s cock, and Q shivers and moans. The sound lights a fire in James’s belly, and he locks eyes with Q and slowly draws his shaft back into his mouth until his lips are wrapped around the base of it. He wants Q thinking of him long after this is over, maybe making space for James in his fantasies about Eve.

Q is shaking with the effort of holding still when James begins in earnest, sucking hard and relaxing his throat. He keeps his grip on Q’s hips firm and doesn’t let up until Q is coming and doing his level best not to let James know exactly how hard. So far as James is concerned, it’s a gauntlet thrown at his feet. He guides Q toward the bedroom, leaving a trail of clothing behind as he strips him. Eve doesn’t move to stop him, and he trusts her to enforce whatever parameters she and Q have agreed on. She’s too good an agent to be a truly good person, but he knows down to blood and bone that her cruelty is never unnecessary or capricious.

The orgasm seems to have either taken the fight out of Q or soothed his nerves, and James isn’t sure which until he moves to take off Q’s glasses. Q slaps his hand away, a reflex with no force behind it, and James catches him by the wrist. Q draws back, suddenly wary, and there’s no trace of his earlier indecision. He’s calm and focused, and he glares at James without the least acknowledgement that he’s in his boxers. Or, for that matter, that James can still taste his come on the back of his tongue. Or that there’s nothing he can do to make James let go if he chooses not to. Q isn’t afraid of him, and James lets go of his last shred of hesitation.

He chuckles softly and kisses Q’s hand before relinquishing it. “All right, then.”

Eve’s behind him, then, her nimble fingers unbuttoning his shirt and her chin resting on his shoulder. Her crisp curls brush his throat when she says, “Play nice.”

James is sure it was meant for him, but he’s charmed all the same when Q flushes like he’s been reprimanded. Between Eve’s hands sliding over his skin, half undressing him and half caressing him, and the heat of her breasts against his back, he almost misses Q’s once-over. It’s furtive, not meant to be noticed, and James smirks at him. Eve’s hand closes around his length and slides gracefully along it, and James feels the pleasant ache of it all the way up his spine when Q tries not to watch.

By the time Eve has him naked, he’s so hard it hurts, and Q’s cock is starting to thicken again. James moves to return the favor, but Eve’s amused smile stops him. The dress she’s wearing isn’t easy to slide off, but the skirt is full and loose, and James trails a gentle hand up her thigh instead. Her cunt is slick and hot against his fingers, and her eyes darken when his fingertips find her clit. James wants to pull them both onto the bed with him, fuck them until they’re sated, and spend the night with Eve between them. She doesn’t let him sleep in her bed, as a rule. He thinks she might bend it if he’s good enough, tonight.

Eve turns him around and nudges him back toward Q, instead. Q’s forgotten not to stare, and when James presses fingers damp with Eve’s juices against his lips, he parts them willingly. It’s not precisely disobeying, James thinks. When Q’s tongue darts over the pads of his fingers, soft and warm and quick, James’s skin crackles with it.

He pushes Q back onto the mattress, strips off his boxers, and spreads his knees in the space of a few seconds. As careful as James has been so far, the blitz seems to catch Q by surprise, and he pushes back. James gets a firmer grip on Q’s thighs and puts his weight behind it, and Q squirms as James folds him practically in half and forces his legs wide.

“Absolutely gorgeous,” James murmurs. He doesn’t miss the fact that Q’s still hard. 

When he lets go, Q uncurls but doesn’t move away. When he presses two lube-slicked fingers against Q’s entrance, Q shivers but doesn’t object. The sharp, breathless gasp when James finds his prostate turns into a wide-eyed groan when James strokes it, hard. Q arches off the bed, his composure gone.

James hasn’t wanted to fuck anyone so badly since the last time he had Eve. He makes himself take his time over working Q open and tries to think of Q’s moans as a reward for his patience. Q’s damnably tight, and however much James might want to maul him, he doesn’t want to _hurt_ him.

It’s worth it when he finally pins Q to the bed and sinks into him, feels him stretch tight around his cock. His long legs are tense against James’s hips, and that gorgeous mouth that James isn’t allowed to kiss has fallen open. Q seems almost overwhelmed already, and James has barely gotten started. The noise Q makes when James is finally in him up to the hilt has Eve swallowing hard, and James grins at her. On an impulse, he twists his fingers in Q’s hair and pulls his head back until Eve can see his face. The angle has Q’s spine bowing up, pressing him harder against James, and James thrusts into him in response.

It’s short and shallow, almost experimental, and Q responds beautifully. James flexes his hips, and Q’s nails dig into his back. James throws caution to the wind, then, and soon Q is writhing under him, bucking and panting and moaning. James can almost believe he’s the first to have Q like this, from the reaction he’s getting. It spurs him on, harder and faster. When Q comes again, he crushes himself against James’s chest and cries out wordlessly, and James wrings every last second of it out of him before he spills into Q’s body himself.

James pulls out reluctantly, wanting more than anything to keep Q impaled on his cock. Eve’s eyes are glittering, though, and he knows better than to try her patience. He shoots her a crooked smile, then makes a show of sliding down Q’s body to the mess he’s made of his stomach. Eve sucks in a quick breath when James begins to lick him clean.

The tiny tremors that run through Q’s belly every time James’s tongue touches his skin makes James want to fuck him all over again, but it’s Eve’s turn now. Her hand strokes along his back, hot against the cooling sweat, and he takes pride in a job well done. Q’s barely begun pulling himself back together when Eve cups his chin and makes him look at her.

When she brushes a kiss over his lips, he whimpers and tries to follow her mouth. She guides him back down to the mattress and straddles his chest, a luminous goddess smiling down on a prostrate worshiper. Q certainly looks close enough to a religious ecstasy that James wonders if he could get the boy hard again, if Eve would let him suck Q’s cock while she’s using his mouth. He doesn’t want to risk breaking the spell to ask. It’s enough to watch her face when Q’s tongue finds the right spot over and over again, when Q’s deft hands raise gooseflesh on her skin, when the light catches her curls and crowns her with a proper halo, when she finally climaxes. It doesn’t take long, and James thinks about how close she must have been just from watching him with Q. It makes him bold enough to pull her against him when she climbs off of Q, her breath coming fast and her thighs slick. She lets him, relaxing against him with a contented sigh.

It’s a few moments before Q stirs, and James frowns when he moves toward the edge of the bed. He catches Q by the ankle, stopping him, and looks to Eve in mute appeal. She smiles and leans forward to tangle her fingers in Q’s hair.

“Surely you’re not quite done yet?” she asks softly. Q’s hard, but he’s also shaky and flushed.

He gives in, and Eve strokes his forehead and praises him. James wraps his tongue around Q’s cock again, this time slipping three fingers into Q’s ass while he’s at it. Q’s too spent to hold back, and he moans loud and twists his hips. Eve quiets him with a long, deep kiss, and James thinks of protesting but doesn’t. He wants to hear Q, but he wants Q’s permission more. James is slow and thorough, and by the time Q’s at the brink again James’s jaw aches and his forearm is cramping. Q’s almost sobbing, though, and, when it finally happens, he all but tears himself apart at the seams from the force of it.

Q’s too drained to protest when James gathers him in his arms and reclines lazily on Eve’s pillows, practically daring her to kick him out of bed. She gives him a warning look and brushes Q’s hair out of his eyes.

“Well done, darling,” she murmurs, and Q sighs and leans into her touch. James feels a flash of jealousy, though he’s not sure why. He knows Eve and Q aren’t sleeping together, or if they are, it’s a vanishingly infrequent thing. But she’s more at ease around Q. Softer. Gentler.

James lowers his head to the nape of Q’s neck and kisses him, his mouth open and his tongue tracing the path of Q’s spine. Q shivers against him, and James reaches for Eve’s hand. He wants her to join them and fall asleep beside him. Q’s perfect cupid’s bow lips part, and his eyes open.

“Please,” he says.

Eve smiles gently and relents, settling in against them. James wraps a possessive arm around her waist and kisses her bare shoulder without letting go of Q. He’s still not sure what he’s done to deserve her largesse, but he’s certain he could spend the next month thanking her for it.


End file.
